"This is your hour, and the
power of darkness." Luke 22:53
It is not being reconciled to the fact of sin that produces all the
disasters in life. You may talk about the nobility of human nature, but there
is something in human nature which will laugh in the face of every ideal you
have. If you refuse to agree with the fact that there is vice and self-seeking,
something downright spiteful and wrong in human beings, instead of reconciling
yourself to it, when it strikes your life, you will compromise with it and say
it is of no use to battle against it. Have you made allowance for this hour and
the power of darkness, or do you take a recognition of yourself that misses out
sin? In your bodily relationships and friendships do you reconcile yourself to
the fact of sin? If not, you will be caught round the next corner and you will
compromise with it. If you reconcile yourself to the fact of sin, you will
realize the danger at once – Yes, I see what that would mean. The recognition
of sin does not destroy the basis of friendship; it establishes a mutual regard
for the fact that the basis of life is tragic. Always beware of an estimate of
life which does not recognize the fact that there is sin.
Jesus Christ never trusted human nature, yet He was never cynical, never
suspicious, because He trusted absolutely in what He could do for human nature.
The pure man or woman, not the innocent, is the safeguarded man or woman. You are
never safe with an innocent man or woman. Men and women have no business to be
innocent; God demands that they be pure and virtuous. Innocence is the
characteristic of a child; it is a blameworthy thing for a man or woman not to
be reconciled to the fact of sin.